A straightforward lie

[fpb]

It is my experience that Thatcherites, neo-liberists et hoc genus omne are pretty free and easy with data. Since they assume that statistics cannot but support their views, their interpretation of events and numbers tends to be, shall we say, loose. But does anything justify this semi-paragraph from the National Review?

While go-go capitalist countries like the United States, Australia, and the UK, and economically dynamic Scandinavian free-traders like Denmark and Sweden rank highest on happiness surveys, the economically sclerotic nations of “Old Europe” — such as Belgium, Austria, Germany, and France — are relegated to second-tier, “less happy” status. Worse still, France lurks at the bottom of the “less happy” nations, doing barely better than the relatively “unhappy” Italians.

"Economically dynamic Scandinavian free traders." Think about it. After a monstrosity of that kind, even to suggest that Italians and French might be "unhappy" for reasons not directly related to the joys of unfettered free enterprise (such as, say, being in the front line of an avalanche of immigration which is poisoning social relations all over the country) is a comparatively minor matter. This is a man who lives in dreamland.

Comments

[dustthouart.livejournal.com]

I remember reading an article that had a survey of different countries and their attitudes towards the French, and France had the highest percentage saying they disliked the French. Something like 35%.

[goreism.livejournal.com]

I suspect Wilkinson's referring to the fact that Scandinavian countries, despite their large government expenditures-to-GDP ratios, score high on indices of "economic freedom." Off the top of my head, Andreas Bergh has done some good work on this; this paper and its references are the place to start, if you can get access to them. Peter Lindert has also shown that the relatively liberal capital taxation regime has helped finance Scandinavian welfare states. Moreover, despite the generous unemployment insurance in Scandinavian countries, the system is structured differently from France and Germany. And finally, Sweden has no minimum wage, adopted school vouchers, partially privatized the pension system, and recently abolished the inheritance tax and the gift tax, just to mention a few examples.

Also, IIRC, the differences in subjective happiness scores persist even when controlling for factors like immigration and population demographics. I can't remember the specific research right now, though I think Robin Hanson might have done it.

That doesn't take away from the fact that subjective happiness reporting often produces some weird and counter-intuitive results, so a lot of economists look at such research as rather dodgy to start out with.

[patchworkmind.livejournal.com]

I'm sure I'd see it if I looked harder, but I'm about to head out to the gym. So I'll just ask and have an "Ah! That's what he meant! moment later on today when I get back to find an LJ-notify in my inbox.

What does rampant immigration have to do with free enterprise? I mean, I can see it right now, but it's on something of a stretch. I hate to be dense, but I've been up for about ten minutes, and I'm already running late. I just had to check my LJ this morning since I didn't do it much at all yesterday.

See you (online) later this afternoon, and I should be more lucid.

Ciao.